Azerbaijani soldiers yesterday hoisted their country’s flag in the final district given up by Armenia under a peace deal that ended weeks of fighting over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region.
A column of Azerbaijani military trucks entered the Lachin district overnight, taking over the last of three regions around Karabakh handed over by Armenia under the Russian-brokered agreement.
Journalists saw soldiers raising the Azerbaijani flag over an administrative building in the town of Lachin in the early hours.
Photo: AFP
Armenia agreed to hand over the three districts — Aghdam, Lachin and Kalbajar — as part of the Nov. 9 deal that stopped an Azerbaijani offensive that had reclaimed swathes of territory lost to Armenian separatists in a 1990s war.
Under the agreement, about 2,000 Russian peacekeepers deployed between the two sides and along the Lachin corridor, a 60km route through the district that connects Karabakh’s main city, Stepanakert, to Armenia.
Russian military vehicles accompanied Azerbaijani trucks driving along the corridor overnight and were deployed at the main crossroads in Lachin.
Most of the town’s residents fled in advance of the takeover, but 48-year-old grocery store owner Levon Gevorgyan said he had decided to stay.
“I am afraid only of God. I have been here for 22 years, I started from nothing, I built everything,” he said. “I hope I will be able to continue, I still have a loan to pay. If I have to leave, I will burn everything.”
As in Aghdam and Kalbajar, residents of Lachin cleared out frantically ahead of the handover, taking livestock, firewood, furniture and even plastic water pipes.
Under the agreement, Armenia is losing control of seven districts that it seized around Karabakh in the 1990s — many Azerbaijanis who were forced to flee are now planning to return.
The separatists are retaining control over most of Karabakh’s Soviet-era territory, but have lost the key town of Shusha.
Lachin official Davit Davtyan said residents of the district had been given until 6pm on Monday to leave, except for about 200 people allowed to stay to maintain infrastructure along the corridor.
“Residents who were not able to leave because they had nowhere to go said they would stay and see what happens on Tuesday,” he said.
In the village of Aghavno along the Lachin corridor, 60-year-old Araksya Gyokchakyan watched residents load furniture and firewood into cars and trucks even as she was set on remaining behind.
“I don’t know where to go. I stayed here during the war. It’s my home,” she said.
Russia is also helping some of the tens of thousands who fled the fighting to return to Karabakh itself.
The Russian Ministry of Defense yesterday said that it had so far assisted in the return of more than 26,000 people, and that its peacekeepers had cleared mines along the Lachin corridor and helped restore a power line.
In related news, Turkey and Russia have agreed to monitor the truce from a joint peacekeeping center, the Turkish Ministry of National Defense said yesterday.
The deal comes after days of talks between Turkish and Russian officials about how the two would jointly implement the Moscow-brokered ceasefire signed last month.
Technical details for setting up the joint center were concluded and an agreement was signed, the Turkish ministry said in a statement, adding that it would begin work “as soon as possible.”
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